An Academy for Liars
65 pages • 2-hour read
Alexis HendersonAn Academy for Liars
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Themes
The Corrupting Nature of Power
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of emotional abuse, death, and child sexual abuse.
The quest for power drives many of the characters in An Academy for Liars. Lennon’s core desire is to cultivate power and possess agency. At the beginning of the novel, she does not feel valued in her relationship with Wyatt and is uncertain about her life’s direction. When she gets to Drayton, she discovers that she is not alone in feeling this way; many of her fellow first years are in similar positions. Lennon reflects: “In a conventional sense, none of them had been slated for particularly promising futures. They hadn’t graduated from Ivy Leagues or accomplished anything worthy of note. They weren’t moneyed or from the sorts of families that mattered” (77). Like Lennon, her classmates lacked direction and potential, and they felt powerless before Drayton.
However, once Lennon discovers her persuasive power, she grapples with the ethical implications of using it. She questions why she and her classmates are entrusted with abilities that can cause real harm. While practicing to hone her power, Lennon believes it is unethical to even persuade her rat in class. However, Dante tries to encourage her to cultivate her power and to assuage her concerns, telling her that ethical people like her must become powerful enough to stand up to those who do not have the same qualms. He says that “people like [her must] become competent enough to stand between them and those they’d otherwise harm. To let [her] scruples get in the way of that vital work is cowardice” (84). He uses this argument to push Lennon to hone her persuasive power, convincing her that she will be using her abilities to stop people with nefarious designs from utilizing persuasion for their own ends.
With time, this idealization fades, and Lennon realizes that the power of persuasion is addictive and corrupting. Eileen exemplifies this. As Lennon’s power grows, she begins to pose a threat to Eileen, prompting Dante to warn Lennon, saying: “Eileen has never enjoyed sharing the spotlight, and she likes sharing power even less” (341). Eileen wants to cling to her power so desperately that she plans to trap Lennon behind the gates at Drayton indefinitely, just so she can secure her personal glory. Eileen is so corrupted by her desire for power that she dehumanizes Lennon entirely, viewing her simply as a tool to be utilized. Lennon ultimately rejects this corruption: When she takes over Eileen’s position, she uses as little of her gatekeeping power as possible, seeking a simple life rooted in love and freedom.
The Ethics and Complexities of Mentor-Student Relationships
Mentor-student relationships significantly shape the narrative of An Academy for Liars, especially the relationship between Dante and Lennon. Initially, Dante is introduced as Lennon’s advisor and mentor, and their relationship has a rocky start. Dante seems uninterested in Lennon, and their first meeting is “brief”; though Lennon finds him attractive, she regards him with “clinical detachment” (61). Yet Dante’s gesture of providing her with sandwiches and ensuring that Lennon is fed subtly illustrate his care for her.
When Lennon has qualms about the morality of persuasion, Dante guides her forward and pushes her to keep going. This influences her deeply. Later, when Nadine questions the ethics of persuasion in conversation with Lennon, Lennon finds herself echoing Dante’s philosophy. She says: “‘I…I don’t like to examine things through the lens of good and evil. It’s reductive.’ Christ, Lennon thought to herself, she sounded just like Dante” (236). Dante’s beliefs begin shaping Lennon’s internal dialogue and ethical stance, showing his deep influence over her.
However, despite Dante’s philosophical musings about the reductive nature of good and evil, Lennon soon realizes that persuasion can cause real harm, especially after she uses her gatekeeping abilities to kill Ian. Though she acted in self-defense, Lennon is haunted by the damage she’s caused. She confronts Dante, feeling betrayed. She asks him: “All those months ago, you said I wouldn’t have to hurt anyone. You lied. Why did you lie to me?” (315). Dante’s response highlights both his personal and strategic motives. He says: “I thought I’d lose you if I didn’t […]. And even back then I knew a talent like yours was too great to waste” (315). Dante’s defense of his actions is two pronged: He wants to keep Lennon in his life, and he knows her powers are the only way to save Drayton. Dante acts not only as Lennon’s mentor in encouraging her to study persuasion, but he also hints at his romantic feelings for Lennon in his desire for her presence.
The complexity of their relationship deepens when Lennon discovers Dante’s past relationship with Eileen, who was his mentor when he was a teenage student at Drayton. Eileen coerced him into a romantic relationship. Lennon is disturbed by the exploitative dynamics of that relationship, thinking how Dante had been “just a child himself. Younger even than the son he had now, by the looks of it. The idea of it filled her with revulsion and rage on his behalf” (362). Dante, however, defends Eileen and their relationship, even while hesitating to pursue his romantic feelings for Lennon, recognizing the inherent power imbalance in their mentor-student relationship. Though Dante maintains Eileen did not abuse him, his reluctance to engage romantically with Lennon underscores the nuanced and ethically fraught nature of mentorship and romantic entanglement.
The Psychological Cost of Influence
Persuasion, the central subject studied at Drayton College, requires its practitioners to wield influence over animals, people, and even matter itself. It is an intense power, but it comes with a cost. Persuading others is morally questionable, and this is an issue Lennon wrestles with during her time at Drayton. She does not find manipulating others to be ethical, no matter how much Dante tries to convince her that it is acceptable. The first time Lennon manipulates another person—when she forces Dante to pick up the pig figurine—the act gives her serious seizures, which illustrates the physical cost of persuasion, as it wreaks havoc on Lennon’s body.
Lennon also experiences the emotional cost of using her power. She feels a deep sense of guilt after forcing Ian to stab his own hand during the Logos initiation. Yet her guilt only intensifies after she persuades her family to let her leave with Dante on Christmas Day. Despite her attempt at gentle manipulation, Lennon is still hurt by the experience and especially haunted by her sister Carly’s visible pain: “[Lennon] delivered a feeling of peace, and felt it settle thickly in the minds of her loved ones, turning them all soft and compliant and perhaps a little sleepy. All except Carly, who, sitting stiffly on the couch, gazed at the floor with tear-filled eyes as if betrayed” (258). Carly’s reaction shows that she feels hurt by Lennon’s actions, and this exacerbates Lennon’s guilt about using her power as it further fractures her relationship with her sister.
Lennon’s guilt intensifies her existential crisis. She struggles with her self-identity and with understanding her place in the world. Even after discovering that her gatekeeping power is the key to saving Drayton, she doubts her moral character, thinking that “[s]he was no hero. And she wasn’t even sure she had the spine to call herself a villain. She was just a coward. And she was very afraid” (340). Lennon criticizes herself for being afraid, and this fear stems from the violence of persuasion’s consequences.
However, she comes to realize that her power has some positives. The study of persuasion has facilitated close, supportive friendships, and her friends also want to create good in the world, like her. Alongside the darkness of her moral struggle, she feels a “bright desire to protect [her friends], these people who had stood by her when she couldn’t even stand up for herself, her friends who’d risked everything to defend her, knowing it was an impossible fight” (425). Lennon realizes that though the study of persuasion can cause harm, it has also guided her to form meaningful relationships that are worth defending.
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